As the presidential candidates tweak their positions on the proposed nuclear-waste repository in Nevada, the Nuclear Regulatory Commission is moving ahead with its review, NRC chairman Dale Klein said Tuesday.
Agency staff are reviewing the federal Department of Energy’s 8,600-page application for the Yucca Mountain Repository.
If the application is deemed complete, it will be placed on the NRC docket in September.
That, Klein said, would start the clock on the agency’s deliberations.
Congress has given the commission three years to determine technical feasibility, safety and security of the project. The NRC can ask for one additional year.
“This is big and technically difficult,” said Klein, who was in Denver to meet with representatives of the uranium mining industry.
The fate of the repository, about 90 miles from Las Vegas, has been politically charged for two decades.
Arizona Sen. John McCain, the prospective Republican candidate, has been a supporter of Yucca Mountain.
In May, however, the idea of an international repository for nuclear waste was raised.
Democratic candidate Sen. Barack Obama has opposed the Yucca Mountain project, saying the repository should be located in a state willing to take it or that regional facilities should be built.
“We don’t get into politics,” said the NRC’s Klein. The NRC evaluation is strictly technical, he said.
Once the application is placed on the commission’s docket, parties such as Nevada, the city of Las Vegas and Nye County (site of the facility) likely will file objections and seek a hearing, NRC officials said.
Those hearings — before the Atomic Safety Licensing Board — could begin early next year in Las Vegas.
“There will be a dialogue all the way” on the evaluation, Klein said.
Mark Jaffe: 303-954-1912 or mjaffe@denverpost.com
